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The issue of clients requesting Speculative work from designers is
becoming more commonplace. The issues regarding Speculative work or
‘Free Pitching’ have been debated for a long time and are now compounded
by the economic down turn, meaning that some designers are now more
willing to work for free while others have taken the opposite view.

This practice is not uncommon and requesting new and original work to
be created in this manner, is one that seriously compromises the
quality of work that is presented. Clients requesting speculative design
work has a long term damaging effect on the industry, this is
recoginsed both in Ireland and internationally.

Successful design work results from a collaborative process between a
client and the designer, with the intention of the designer to develop a
clear sense of the client’s objectives, competitive situation and their
commercial needs. Speculative design competitions or processes, result
in a superficial assessment of the work submitted and is not grounded in
a client’s business dynamics as quite often, there is no clear brief or
objectives given from the outset.

Design creates value for our clients. The strategic approach
designers take in addressing the clearly identified problems or needs of
the client is one of great importance. Speculative or open competitions
for work based on a perfunctory problem statement will not result in
the most effective design solution for the client.

Clients requesting work for free demonstrates a lack of respect for
the designer & the design process, the value & benefits that
effective design has for the client and for the time of the
professionals who are asked to provide it. Speculative design work
threatens the integrity and work ethic of our profession, commoditises
our industry and destroys the value of effective design.

Neither the designer nor the client benefit from work created in a
speculative manner. Because designers have no guarantee of remuneration,
those who work on spec are unlikely to engage in the full design
process and conduct the research and analysis needed to produce
effective work. As work carried out in this manner often means that
there is no provision of or opportunity for a client briefing, the
designers’ abilities to act as professional consultants, partners or
members of the client’s strategic communications team are, therefore not
utilised, further undermining the work carried out by the design
professional.

Producing work in a speculative manner also places smaller design
companies and sole traders at a distinct disadvantage, due to time, cost
and resources required to produce speculative work and engage in this
type of tendering process.

In certain design disciplines, such as architecture, advertising and
broadcast design, business practices differ and professionals have been
expected to participate in speculative work. This usually occurs where
the initial design is not the final product and is followed by extended
financial engagement to refine or execute a design. But also, in these
disciplines, budgets tend to be significantly higher and there is also
an opportunity to exhibit any work produced, in communication design,
this is rarely the case.

Although, recently we have seen advertising agencies in Belgium go on
strike because of the damaging effect that spec pitching is having on
the industry there. So perhaps things are changing?

Best practice internationally strongly discourages client’s
requesting design work to be produced and submitted on a speculative
basis in order to be considered for acceptance as part of a tender or
pitch. Organisations such as AIGA, ICOGRADA, Design Business
Association, Design Business Ireland, the Association of Registered
Graphic Designers of Ontario and NO!SPEC all discourage their members
from producing speculative work.

Many of these organisations have position papers for clients on how
to hire design firms, but pointing the finger at the client and telling
them how to their job is a fudging of responsibilities. Design
organisations have influence with designers, not clients and should use
their influence to raise the level of business acumen amongst their
membership. This would help raise the esteem of the profession and deal
with the issues of free pitching. Recently, the Design Business
Association (UK) published a report titled ‘Design and the Public Good’
with the view to advise the UK Government on how to procure design
services in an ethical manner. But it’s not just State Bodies who
request speculative work, our commercial clients do also.

From a business perspective, producing speculative work raises other
issues. There is the issues costs associated with undertaking work in
this manner, overheads incurred and cost undertaken as part of
unsuccessful bids will clearly have to be covered by subsequent tenders –
in other words, if this client’s doesn’t pay, the next one will have
to. Is this fair to our clients? And, therefore it begs the question… is
it really a ‘free’ pitch? Speculative work is done at no cost to the
client, in the hope of getting paid, does this sound like a sustainable
business model?

Many of these organisations have position papers for clients on how
to hire design firms, but pointing the finger There may also be legal
implications in terms of intellectual property and trademark
infringement with work produced in a speculative manner. The Copyright
and Related Act may be clear on who ‘created’ the work, but who has the
right to use work created in a speculative pitch?

The design process should not be a one-way street, with designers
producing work in a vacuum, with no brief or understanding of the
client’s business objectives. The most effective design solutions comes
from the request of a specific client brief and partnering with the
client to a successful outcome. Speculative design tenders result in
superficial assessments of the project at hand that are not grounded in
the client’s specific needs or strategy.

A more effective and ethical approach to commission work is for the
client to request a panel of suitable designers to submit examples work
from previous assignments accompanied with a statement of how they would
approach the assignment in question. This way the client can assess the
quality of the designers previous work and their way of thinking
without the designers having to supplement the costs and overheads of
producing speculative work. The selected designers can then begin to
work on the assignment by producing an original solution to the client’s
brief, while under contract and without having to work on speculation
up front.

But ultimately it up to us – the designer – to end this practice and
to educate and inform our clients to the best way to commission design.
There will always be designers willing to produce Speculative work and
designers who fear that they will not win business if they do not
participate in these competitions, but it is a risky path for both
designer and clients.